Stratasys Launches Multi-Material Color 3D printer

Hannah Jaracz

Stratasys launched the world's first multi-material full-color 3D printer at the SolidWorks World event in San Diego, Calif. The approximately $330,000 Objet500 Connex3 Color Mutli-material 3D Printer comes equipped with "triple-jetting" technology that combines droplets of three base materials, making separate print runs and painting less necessary. Stratasys says the printer would be a "significant time-saver" for designers and manufacturers, and reports that it can print multi-material objects in hundreds of colors thanks to its incorporation of traditional 2D printer color mixing, using cyan, magenta, and yellow. The rubber and plastic base materials can be integrated and treated to produce end products of widely varying flexibility and rigidity, transparency, and opacity. Stratasys Marketing Manager Bruce Bradshaw says industrial designers will be able to halve the time it takes to bring prototypes to market with the printer. "Being able to produce single products incorporating materials of different rigidity and color has been the holy grail of 3D printing to date," notes TCT publisher Duncan Wood. "This is industrial-grade technology that will afford designers a level of creativity they've never had before.